Prison Mismanagement: UK

UK Prisons: Lost Contracts and Mismanagement

In 2012, G4S lost its contract to operate the Wolds Prison in East Yorkshire. It also failed to win new contracts when the government made the decision to privatize 5 additional prison facilities. That has left G4S operating five prisons in the UK. They are Altcourse, in Liverpool; Parc in Bridgend; Rye Hill, near Rugby; Birmingham Prison; and Oakwood, near Wolverhampton. Several of these facilities have been in the news over the past year.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN G4S, the private company at the center of the Olympic security debacle, has lost its contract to run Britain’s first private prison and failed to win any new contracts in the biggest round of prison privatization in England and Wales so far. The Ministry of Justice said the management of the Wolds […]

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN An investigative report finds that G4S is hiring inexperienced staff that are incapable of keeping control of Oakwood Prison. The prison is described as a place where inexperienced staff clash with prisoners, where drugs and alcohol are more easily come by than education courses, and where vital services are hard to access. […]

SOURCE: ECHO NEWS Britan’s Inspectorate of Prisons has issued a report describing G4S as slow to react to increasing levels of violence. According to a report, the security strategy did not make the necessary links between drugs, gangs, and violence and little had been done to address the disproportionate number of young adults involved in […]

SOURCE: OPEN DEMOCRACY Birmingham Prison reported a steep rise in attacks on staff and prisoners, a 46 percent rise in assaults between 2010-2012. Commenting on the increase, Frances Crook, Executive Director of the Howard League for Penal Reform stated, “Private jails make their profits from having lower staffing levels, and paying staff lower wages. In […]